Obj. ID: 37178
Jewish printed books  Or le-Yesharim by Chaim Avraham Yisrael ben Binyamin Zeevi, Izmir, 1758

This text was prepared by William Gross:

This book is bound with another volume by Zeevi, Gross Family Collection B.750, "Orim Gedolim", his major work. The wook block for the title page, copied from a European Hebrew printing, seems to have cracked during the printing, the lines of the break showing.
Zeevi (ca. 1650 - 1731) was a great-grandson of Jerusalem rabbi Israel ben Azariah Zeevi, and grandson of the Moroccan kabbalist Abraham Azulai. He was a pupil of his uncle, Isaac Azulai[3] and was married to the daughter of Abraham ben Levi Conque. His cousin, Abraham ben David Yitzhaki, the Chief Rabbi of Palestine, married his daughter.
From 1701 to 1731, Zeevi was chief rabbi of Hebron where he headed the "Emeth le-Ya'akov" yeshivah which had been founded by Abraham Pereira of Amsterdam. It was the oldest such college still functioning in Hebron at the turn of the 20th century. He also acted as an emissary of Hebron, visiting Constantinople in 1685 where he met Tzvi Ashkenazi.
Izmir became an important center of Hebrew printing in the Ottoman Empire beginning in the mid-17th century. Its first printing house was founded in 1657 by Avraham b. Yedidya Gabbai, who published in Izmir in two distinct periods, from 1657-1660, and again from 1671-1675. After Gabbai left Izmir, all printing activity in that city ceased for the next fifty years. It was resumed between 1728-1739 by the Istanbul printer Yonah b. Ya’akov of Zalazitz and his partner Rabbi David Hazan, and then again lay dormant until for 15 years.
One of the two printing houses established between 1754-1755 was that of the Greek printer Osta Maragos. Some five books, including the present volume, were printed by Maragos between 1755-1758.